New Athens Prep
by Glaikit
Summary: ANOTHER high school solangelo fic. I just couldn't help myself.
1. Chapter 1

Will slapped Cecil's hand away from his stack of pens. It was mid-morning on their first day of sophomore year, and his best friend was already testing his patience. He was trying to keep his attention on what the teacher was saying by carefully filling in his planner as she walked them through the syllabus, but Cecil seemed determined to throw off his color-coding system. Lou Ellen was on the other side of Cecil, trying to stifle her laughter. Will had missed her over the summer. He and Cecil were some of only a dozen non-boarding students at New Athens Prep Academy. Most of their classmates lived in the school dorms during the semesters and spent summers with their families. Lou Ellen had flown in just last night, and had been filling them in on her summer spent touring Europe between classes. The only summer highlight Will and Cecil could offer was that the 24-hour diner in town added a new milkshake flavor.

Will didn't let it get to him though - he knew that he was lucky to be at the school in the first place. New Athens Prep had an agreement with the surrounding school districts that they would waive the tuition fee if local students met their academic requirements. Most of the kids Will and Cecil had grown up going to school with were now attending the public high school in the next county over. Will had decided at a young age to become a doctor, and the local high school only had one AP science class compared to New Athens Prep's offering of more than 30, in addition to some IB courses. Besides, Will idolized his older brother, Michael, and he had gone to the school before joining the Marines. Before he was killed on-duty last spring.

The bell for lunch rang and everyone began to pack their bags as their teacher reminded them that they had to read two chapters and a write a reflection for Wednesday. The three of them walked toward the student lounge, Lou Ellen detouring through the cafe to buy lunch. Will and Cecil found their usual table and sat down to eat. Will glanced up in time to see his sister, Kayla, walk through the archway. She was wearing a deer-in-headlights look similar to what Will was sure he had on his first day last year. Will had been completely overwhelmed by the differences between the small middle school they went to with 20 kids in each grade compared to this place, with its grand brick buildings and hallways lined with glass cases displaying trophies and four times as many students. Will was about to wave Kayla over when Lou Ellen nearly ran into her, then grabbed her bag strap and pulled her toward their table.

The two girls sat down and Kayla sighed. "I got lost on my way to literally every class so far." Lou Ellen patted her shoulder gently before opening her bag of chips.

"Did anyone else from your grade transfer in?" Will asked.

Kayla shrugged. "There's a boy who I went to school with - Jeremy something - but I haven't seen him yet and we weren't really friends." She took a bite of her sandwich and then made a muffled noise and tried to swallow quickly. "Actually, you remember Nico di Angelo? He's in my history class. Maybe they moved back or something?"

Will did remember Nico. They had all played together on Saturdays in the park in town when they were younger - Will and his siblings, Cecil, and Percy Jackson and his cousins: Bianca and Nico. Nico was Kayla's age, talked non-stop, had been obsessed with some card game, and idolized his sister. Bianca had been nice and brave and adventurous, but Will didn't know her very well. He spent most of his time helping Cecil build things or playing pranks on Kayla.

Will remembered the day three years ago when his parents sat them down and told them Bianca had been hit by a car, that she was badly hurt and might not make it. Then, a week after that, putting on his nicest clothes too go to her funeral. They sat near the back of the church but he could see Nico sitting completely still next to his father, Percy in the row behind them sitting between his divorced parents. He saw Nico one more time after that, a Saturday in the park a couple weeks later. Nico was unusually quiet and Percy kept trying to get him to climb trees with them. Then, all of a sudden, he was shouting at Percy - Will didn't remember about what. Michael had been doing homework at a picnic table, half watching them, and ran over to calm Nico down. He called their parents from a pay phone, and ten minutes later a fancy black car picked Nico up. His dad moved them out to California a couple weeks later.

Cecil had asked Kayla something while Will was lost in his memories. "... totally different. Didn't talk to anyone, sort of glared out the window most of the class, that sort of thing. But, I mean, after Bianca…" Kayla looked down and absently picked at the other half of her sandwich.

They all got quiet, except for Lou Ellen, who was looking around, confused. "Who's Bianca?"

Will sighed. "She was Nico's sister, would've been … a senior this year, I think? She was hit by a car a few years ago and Nico and his dad moved away after that. It was really hard for both of them." Lou Ellen just nodded. Will couldn't help but remember the few months after Michael died. Even though he hadn't been living at home anymore, his absence was palpable. Everything felt alien.

Their table fell into a tense silence, everyone thinking about Bianca and Michael and the helplessness that came with unexpected deaths. A loud whistle on the other side of the lounge snapped them out of the moment. Percy Jackson was standing up and waving toward the door. Will glanced over and saw Nico, same messy black hair and olive-toned skin Will remembered, glaring daggers at Percy, who seemed oblivious to Nico's irritation. Nico sighed and made his way toward him anyway, sitting down between Annabeth Chase and Grover Underwood.

Lou Ellen used the interruption as an opportunity to steer the conversation toward a brighter subject, turning toward Kayla and asked about her teachers for the semester. Will tuned them out and studied Nico. Will always found the similarities and differences between family members interesting. Nico and Percy seemed to have almost opposite personalities, but some of their mannerisms were identical. The messy black hair too. Will wondered if Nico and his dad had moved back, or if he was staying in the dorms. Will vaguely remembered Nico and Bianca having the newest video games and getting dropped off at the park by a car that looked expensive, but apart from that Will didn't have any idea what their dad did or if they were the type of family who could afford tuition and boarding there.

Will tried to see flashes of the excitable 10 year old Nico had been. It was tricky - at the moment he was sinking lower into his seat and rolling his eyes at something Percy said. Will wondered how much of the change was from Bianca's death … but then supposed that something like that was so huge that you couldn't really isolate its effects. He didn't think that Kayla was all that different, really, but she was more cynical, quicker to cry or get angry since Michael died. Will envied her sometimes, how open she was with her emotions, but he had also seen the heartbreak in his mother's eyes when she was comforting Kayla and couldn't bring himself to add to his parents' stress. So, he put on big smiles and saved his real emotions for when he was alone, in the shower or late at night. And some days it felt like he was playing the part of a character called Will, going through the motions and reciting a memorized script, and it all felt empty. But he wasn't sure what he would be like if he didn't put so much energy into acting normal.

Nico looked up sharply and Will realized he'd probably been staring for a while now. He smiled awkwardly and sort of waved - no use pretending he wasn't looking directly at Nico - and Nico just lifted an eyebrow in response and turned away. Will tried to suppress his blush and pick up the thread of whatever Kayla and Lou Ellen were talking about.

"Ugh and he's that dark-and-mysterious type you like, right Will?" Lou Ellen asked, waiting for his response.

"Wha-what? Who?"

"That barista at the coffee shop right off campus - Kayla hasn't ever been there. I was telling her their mochas are _almost_ as tasty as their staff, which is saying something with us being in the middle of nowhere and all."

"Oh, yeah… sure."

Cecil chuckled and picked up his trash. "No, she was talking about our chem teacher who is eternally grumpy and about a hundred years old. And who will give us detention if we're late the first class of the semester so we should probably get going."


	2. Chapter 2

One of the things Nico had come to appreciate about attending a boarding school was just how late he could push sleeping in on weekdays. His alarm was set for 15 minutes before his first class, and that gave him just enough time to brush his teeth, throw on the uniform, splash water on his face, and walk from the boys' dorm to the main hall, where he could pick up a huge cup of coffee and claim a seat all before the teacher walked in. The downside was that it usually took a little longer than that for the coffee to take effect.

Luckily, his first class on Mondays and Wednesdays was Ancient World History. It was the one subject he and his father could discuss without an argument breaking out, meaning their weekly 'father-son quality time' had been spent watching nearly every documentary, listening to nearly every podcast, and visiting nearly every museum exhibit that touched on any notable event between the Iron Age and the invention of Facebook. Over the past few weeks they hadn't yet covered anything that Nico wasn't already familiar with, so he had gotten in the habit of spending the first half of class soaking up caffeine and staring out the window, which was precisely what he was doing when he heard the dreaded phrase: "group project."

Nico's eyes snapped to the front of the room. He hated group projects. Not only was he forced to speak to random classmates, but he also had to rely on them. And they usually got things finished behind deadline and couldn't write a thesis statement to save their lives. He would rather do the full project all on his own and let them just take his (usually very good) grade - but then they would see that as him being 'nice' or 'cool' and he didn't want to give them the wrong impression… it was a minefield. The teacher began passing sheets out with the guidelines and rubric and his stomach dropped again when she announced that partners would be assigned. He sighed and started reading over the project requirements.

He had been sent to New Athens Prep because his father was concerned that he wasn't 'enjoying his youth' and hoped that being around Percy would encourage him to 'connect with his peers.' As part of his agreement to attend, he had negotiated with his father to get a single dorm room in exchange for participating in an extracurricular club 'so he could bond with new friends' … but he had been thrilled to come across the school coding club, which required minimal social interaction: they were only communicating through an online forum as they built a website for a nearby nonprofit this semester. Suffice it to say, he could count the number of conversations he'd had with any of his new classmates on one hand. A group project would ruin his track record.

If he had any luck, his partner would agree to just split the project in half. He could take all of the research and write the 5 page paper, and all his partner would have to do is stand up in front of the class, talk about it for 10 minutes, and make everyone do some stupid activity. The teacher started pairing students on opposite ends of the alphabet: Austen and Williams, Brown and Tucker, Cooper and Thomas, di Angelo and Solace. Nico looked over at Kayla Solace and mentally shrugged. At least it wasn't a completely new person. She made eye contact and gave him the exact same awkward half smile and wave Will had a few weeks ago. Nico rolled his eyes. Apparently being a complete dork was genetic.

The last half of class was open for groups to choose their topic: an example of Classical Greek culture that has impacted modern life. Kayla moved to take them empty seat next to him and opened her notebook.

Before she could start on whatever boring topic she had probably chosen, Nico spoke up. "Ok, so I think we should cover the Peloponnesian War - the structure of the US government was literally built based on lessons learned from Athens during that war. I'll write the paper and can put the presentation together based on it, you just have to talk to the class and do whatever activity you want. Deal?" Nico began to write bullet points of the main themes of the paper. He glanced up when Kayla didn't say anything.

She was just staring at him … with a hint of annoyance? "Absolutely not, that's ridiculous."

"Wh-ridiculous? How? You can sit back and do nothing for the next two weeks and get an A for just showing up and reading my bullet points off of slides. Only an idiot would turn that down. Don't be stupid. What, do you think I won't get us an A?"

"Do you think I wouldn't get us an A? Excuse me for actually wanting to do the project properly. Also, Classical Architecture is obviously more impactful than whatever war you're talking about."

"Architecture? Whatever … whatever war? Tell me how the way someone stacked stones on top of one another is more important than how the democracy of our country was created. Seriously, Solace."

"Yes. Seriously. Also, I'm not doing the presentation all by myself just because you're afraid of public speaking."

"I- what- I'm not afraid, I just hate doing it… it's pointless… and .. " he trailed off, gesturing. He knew he looked like his dad in the middle of an argument at that exact moment and he hated it.

"Convincing."

Nico just leaned back and glared at Kayla. She glared back. The bell rang and while everyone rushed to pack their things the teacher reminded them to tell what topic they picked before Wednesday.

"We'll continue this discussion at lunch, meet me at my table," Kayla said, and left before Nico could argue. This was going to be a long two weeks.

After writing a thorough list of pros and cons for the Peloppensian War vs architecture during his next two classes, Nico bought an apple from the cafe and made his way toward the student lounge. He saw Kayla and a few of her friends sharing a table with her brother, Cecil, and a girl Nico didn't know. Percy caught his eye, a few tables away, but Nico gestured toward Kayla's table. Percy must have taken this to mean that Nico was actually friends with them or something and gave two thumbs up and started shooing Nico away. He was firmly in the 'you should be more social it's good for you' camp. Nico rolled his eyes and kept walking.

Nico pulled a chair up next to Kayla, sat down, and took a bite of his apple. Will, directly across from him, looked up and smiled. "Hey, Nico! So ... how have you liked being back?"

He was saved from suffering through what promised to be painfully cheerful small talk by Kayla's immediate launch into a speech. "Oh good, you're here. So, I had second period with Austin, who was sitting next to Brittany and Jerome in World History this morning and he said that they already claimed the Peloponnesian War. We can't double up on topics so that means we're doing architecture - problem solved!"

"They already talked to -"

"Yep."

"What if we do the battle of -"

"Nope."

"Maybe we can talk them out of -"

"Absolutely not. We're doing architecture. I'll even let you skip the presentation, but you still have to help with the activity and I'm going to help with the research. You can write the paper if you really want to."

Nico took another bite of his apple and just glared at Kayla for a few seconds while he chewed. "Fine."

"Great! See you Wednesday."

Nico gave Kayla what he hoped was an extra-strong glare, then took another bite of his apple. He heard Will quietly chuckle from across the table. "She does that to me too, it's exhausting."

Nico glanced over at Will, who didn't seem as uncomfortable with (what he thought was) his murderous glare as the rest of the table, and couldn't help but grin a little. He got up and walked over to Percy's table without saying anything else.

"Hey! Nico! What was that all about, huh? You and Kayla Solace? Playground sweethearts all grown up?" Percy waggled his eyebrows. Nico just rolled his eyes and sat down next to Annabeth.

"Hey, I'm Jason." A tall blond boy was sitting next to Percy. He had that all-American-jock look to him that Nico had learned to distrust at his old school. He didn't say anything.

After a beat of awkward silence, Percy chimed in again. "Jason, meet my charismatic and outgoing cousin, Nico. His bark is worse than his bite, don't worry." Percy turned back toward Nico, "Jason's a stray I picked up in my chem class. Pretty hopeless but I guess we'll keep him around," he said as he shoved his shoulder.

"Whatever, bro, you just want someone to make sure you don't blow up the lab." Jason punched Percy's shoulder. Nico tried very hard to not roll his eyes.

"Jason, if you can keep Percy from doing that all semester, you'll get a metal," Annabeth chimed in. She turned to Nico as the two boys continued their banter. "Jason just transferred in this year too, I can't tell if Percy is in love or sizing up the competition."

Nico offered a half smile. It was hard being the new kid, and while Jason seemed a little bro-ish for his tastes, it would be nice to have another person sit with them. Percy's best friend, Grover, usually skipped lunch in favor of extra band practice. Nico wasn't sure if Annabeth had close friends - they might all be books? Either way, he definitely didn't enjoy being the third wheel.

He forced a smile at some dumb joke Percy and Jason made and reconsidered - he might be more irritated with Percy and Jason being bros than he was with Percy and Annabeth being occasionally 'cute.' It was going to be a long school year.


End file.
